Some London Notes

Chief of the European Service, J.T.A.

London

The postman, who doesn’t always ring twice in this country, goes for a walk on his day off. The busman goes riding. What does a doctor do?

Dr. J. J. Golub, head of the Hospital for Joint Diseases in New York, was here on a brief trip to confer regarding the plans and construction of the new Rothschild-Hadassah Hospital for Palestine. Dr. Chaim Yassky, director of the Hadassah Medical Organization, came here from Jerusalem to meet him. The pair spent a crowded week going over plans, conferring with the committee and directors and what not. They had a bright Saturday free.

Of course. They spent that early Spring afternoon visiting one hospital after another and then compared notes on their observations.

MR. HORE-BELISHA AGAIN

At the risk of having sinister motives ascribed to me, I must mention Mr. Hore-Belisha, the Minister of Transport, once again. He is without any question, the most talked-of man in all the British Isles. Every pedestrian has something to say about the “Belisha bubbles” which point the way to safe crossings of London streets. Every motorist has plenty to say now because of the new thirty miles per hour speed limit for which the Minister of Transport is largely responsible, and which is being enforced by disguised motor police, known as “gongsters” because of the gong with which they summon violators to stop. Every one is either a pedestrian or a motorist—unless he is a cyclist, and the several million cyclists here are also talking of Hore-Belisha and his reported plan to make them all get licenses.

Not even Herr Hitler’s jealous bid for London newspaper space by his announced repudiation of the Versailles Treaty, could do more than slightly diminish the number of words which went into type concerning Hore-Belisha. For publicity purposes, this man is a combination British version of Huey Long, Father Coughlin, General Johnson and three-quarters of the Administration at Washington. And now, I am told, he has a new stunt ready to spring on the public.

THOSE COLUMNISTS

Sam Goldwyn, Hollywood producer, accompanied by Mrs. Goldwyn, came to London on a flying business trip only to find that he had to spend most of his time denying the truth of the “Once in a Lifetime” stories that have been attached to his name.

“My boy,” he told a persistent reporter, “those stories are just a lot of twaddle. Not one of them ever came from me. They were all invented by a gang of lazy columnists in the States. Those boys have to do a whole thousand or so words every day and they are not very particular where they get their stories from.

“They think out a bright one and stick it on to anyone whose name happens to come to their stupid minds. And they stick like limpets, those stories,” he complained.

NO ORANGES FOR IRELAND

Just when all the columnists were looking up “Abie’s Irish Rose” and cleaning their typewriter keys for a few paragraphs about the Irish and the Jews, the authorities stepped in and spoiled it all. Announcement of a trade agreement between the Irish Free State and Palestine, including a barter arrangement involving Irish cattle for Jaffa oranges, had been expected momentarily. President de Valera, it had been confidently reported, was to take his first vacation in several years by visiting Palestine. But the party of Irish pilgrims to the Holy Land left without Mr. de Valera. And now the Free State’s Ministry for External Affairs reports there is nothing doing on the trade agreement.

Incidentally, the Palestine orange-growers have taken a sheaf out of the California industry’s notebook. London is well-covered with smart, attractive advertising of Palestine’s citrus products.

FORGOTTEN HISTORY

An interesting page of well-nigh forgotten history was recalled here when the Home Office announced it had banned an episode depicting the Gordon Riots of 1780 which was to have been included in the Tower Pageant and Tatoo in connection with the Silver Jubilee. No reason for the ban was given.

The Gordon Riots were led by that strange character, Lord George Gordon, son of the third Duke of Gordon. Lord George, after a career in the Navy was elected to Parliament. In 1778, at the head of a wild mob, he presented a bill for the repeal of the acts removing the disabilities against Roman Catholics. He was imprisoned in the Tower, but later acquitted. A few years later, he came forth again as an ardent Protestant champion. Surprisingly, at almost the same time, he sought to enter the Jewish faith but his application was refused by the Chief Rabbi. A Birmingham rabbi, however, received him into the covenant although it was bruited about that his conversion was only to gain support from the Jews for his many schemes.

Gordon was convicted of libelling a judge in 1787, and, according to the Jewish Encyclopedia, “retiring to Birmingham, he lived quietly in the house of a Jew, wearing a long beard and adopting Jewish customs. In 1788 he was sentenced to five years imprisonment….During his stay in New-gate, he comformed strictly in all respects to the Jewish religion, eating kosher meat and wearing phylacteries.”

But at the expiration of his term, Gordon was unable to pay the heavy fine and put up the two guarantees of good behavior.

A prison fever closed the career of one of the most bizarre figures in Anglo-Jewish history.